Both installers enable you to select, create, or modify disk partitions during an installation.

The Live Media contains a set of software that is appropriate for
a desktop or laptop. The text installer installs a smaller set of
software that is more appropriate for a general-purpose server system.

The text installer has the following advantages over the GUI installer:

Enables you to install the operating system on either SPARC or x86 based systems.

Can be used on systems that do not have, or do not require, graphics cards.

Can require less memory than the GUI installer, depending on your system's specifications.

Enables manual configuration of the network and naming services.

If the network is setup to perform automated installations, you can perform a text installation over the network by setting up an install service on the network and selecting a text installation when the client system boots.

Note - The package set installed by the text installer is the solaris-large-server package set. However, if you use the text installer over the network, a different, smaller package set, solaris-auto-install, is installed. After booting into the installed system, you should install the solaris-large-server package set.

In addition to modifying partitions, the text installer enables you to create and modify VTOC slices within the Solaris partition.

Installations Requiring Server Setup

You can perform a “hands-free” installation of the Oracle Solaris software on single
or multiple client systems by using the Automated Installer (AI) feature.

Note - Each system requires network access because the installation process retrieves packages from a
networked repository.

To use AI, you must first set up a server on your
network. When a client system boots, the system gets installation specifications from the
server, retrieves software packages from an Oracle Solaris package repository, and the software is
installed on the client system.

AI can perform “hands-free” automatic network installations on both x86 and SPARC based
client systems. The install clients can differ in architecture, disk and memory capacity,
and other characteristics. The installations can differ in network configuration, packages installed, and other
specifications.

Once you have an AI server set up, you have two additional
installation options beyond the “hands-free” network installations.

You have the option to perform an interactive text installation over the network. The interactive installation enables you to further customize the installation specifications for any particular system.

The setup for AI includes downloading AI images and storing them on the network or locally. You can burn the image to removable media, such as a CD, DVD, or for x86 installations, a USB flash drive. Then, you can boot the AI media directly on each of your systems to initiate an automated installation. Installations that use AI media are non-interactive.